3S8 
THE OCEAN WOULD. 
Cumae. It forms one of the most interesting spots in that beautiful 
hay. In the month of February, 1865, M. Fignier tells ns he 
traversed its celebrated coast, seated himself on the banks of the 
historical lake, and tasted the produce of this curious manufacture o 
living heings, whose origin dates from the Eoman period. 
Lake Fusaro was in ancient times a place of evil report: Airg' 1 
immortalized it as the mythological Acheron, hut its landscape ha 
nothing of the sadness and desolation which accords with the sojourn 
of the dead. It is a salt pond, shaded with a girdle of magnificent 
trees. It is about a league in circumference, and about a fathom 111 
Fig. 132. Artificial Oyster-bank in Lake Fusaro. 
ist 
depth at its deepest part ; its bottom is muddy and black, like the re* 
of this volcanic region. . ^ 
It will he understood, .from what has been said, that the c 
obstacle to the reproduction of oysters is the absence of any s ° ^ 
body to which the young spawn can attach itself, and the means ^ 
shelter from animals which prey upon them. The fishermen living ^ 
the shores of Lake Fusaro have long realised this, and p rotl 
against it by warehousing, as it were, in the lake near the sea, ^ 
oysters ready to discharge their spawn, while retaining the y'° u 
generations captive in the protected basins, where they are shelter^ 
from various causes of destruction to which oysters are exposed m 
open sea. 
